Business urges single focus on transport woes

By SCOTT MacLEOD

Auckland lobbyists want a single body to take control of the city's transport crisis.

They blame too much dithering and too little co-ordination between city managers for a disjointed public transport system and bitsy road network.

But two Auckland mayors say city leaders are more determined than ever to tackle transport woes.

The biggest lobby, the Auckland Business Forum, said the city suffered from an unfinished road system, a lack of public transport and poor traffic management for one reason - lack of a region-wide governing group.

Project co-ordinator Tony Garnier said his group would urge transport minister Mark Gosche to set up an umbrella body in Auckland to take fast and decisive action.

"The nub of the whole issue is a lack of governance," Mr Garnier said. "It's time for the Government to step in and kick butt and demand action."

The forum - representing Auckland industry chiefs, employers, road carriers and ports - has its own transport blueprint. It says the most urgent need is to finish a "ring-road" network so traffic can move east and west, easing clogged roads in the central city.

Mr Garnier said the Auckland Regional Council had a plan for tackling the city's transport problems, but lacked the teeth to make it happen.

Another group, the Campaign for Public Transport, said better co-ordination between trains, buses and ferries was needed.

Spokesman Chris Harris said it was desirable to run them all from "under one roof," and another member, Steve Doole, said nobody was trying to make public transport splice together.

Mr Doole gave the example of a bus arriving at a station just as the train was leaving.

The lobby groups were speaking amid evidence that petrol price rises have prompted increasing numbers of Aucklanders to spurn their vehicles for public transport.

But the number of vehicles in New Zealand is expected to double by 2018, and business leaders estimate up to $1 billion a year is being lost in Auckland because of traffic jams.

The Mayor of Waitakere and head of the Auckland mayoral forum, Bob Harvey, said claims of a lack of governance were "a little out of date and naive".

Auckland mayors were now meeting every three weeks to nut out solutions to the transport woes, and had united goals for the first time in 50 years.

Mr Harvey said central government input was the missing element, and councils would meet Mr Gosche and some of Prime Minister Helen Clark's staff on October 6 in a further bid for $35 million, which would be added to cash from Infrastructure Auckland for public transport.

"We're saying don't be frustrated - each area has clearly delineated what it wants,"said. "We have a total network picture."

North Shore Mayor George Wood agreed city leaders were united, but added his weight for a centralised transport body in Auckland.

"I believe we should have been addressing this a long time ago," he said.

"Just talking about it is not going to get people out of their cars and into public transport.

He said the centralised body would have to have "people with grunt," the confidence of Aucklanders - and money.

Mr Gosche could not be reached last night.

But last week he told truckies there was general agreement that New Zealand should change the way it managed and financed its transport system.

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